PALM SPRINGS — In a ballroom filled with greater than 1,000 folks elevating cash for LGBTQ+ youths, veteran California legislative chief Toni Atkins didn’t mince phrases: To be a homosexual or transgender teenager proper now, she stated, should really feel like “a rug has been pulled from beneath your feet.”

In her fiery speech on the annual Harvey Milk Variety Breakfast, Atkins, who’s operating for California governor, stated President Trump and different Republicans are working to “legislate our trans siblings out of public life.”

“These aren’t just political stunts: These are acts that put lives in danger and strip away basic human dignity,” Atkins stated. “So hear me, as I say: Trans people belong. Trans youth deserve love, joy and our protection.”

Atkins’ speech, which drew rousing applause, provided a glimpse of how Trump’s efforts to undermine California’s liberal values — together with help for transgender Individuals — will likely be on the coronary heart of the state’s 2026 marketing campaign for governor.

In his first 100 days, Trump issued govt orders banning trans girls from girls’s sports activities and barring the federal authorities from recognizing genders aside from male or feminine.

Trump can be pushing to ban transgender Individuals from the U.S. army, writing in an govt order that transgender id is a “falsehood” inconsistent with the “humility and selflessness required of a service member.” The Supreme Court docket cleared the best way final week for that ban to take impact.

“Cruelty, and an attempt to humiliate, seems to be the point of what they are doing,” stated Lisa Middleton, a transgender lady and former mayor of Palm Springs.

The LGBTQ+ neighborhood has turn out to be a political pressure in shaping statewide coverage and campaigns.

About 2.8 million lesbian, homosexual, bisexual and transgender folks reside in California, greater than in every other state, and Californians overwhelmingly help legal guidelines that shield the LGBTQ+ neighborhood, in accordance with the Public Coverage Institute of California.

Final yr, California voters overwhelming handed a poll measure to enshrine the fitting to same-sex marriage into the state Structure. A proposed poll initiative that might have restricted transgender youth medical care and required colleges to inform mother and father about their little one’s gender id didn’t get sufficient signatures to qualify for the November poll.

Polling by the Los Angeles Occasions final yr discovered that greater than 3 in 4 Individuals see points associated to transgender and nonbinary folks — which have an effect on a fraction of the American inhabitants — as a distraction from extra urgent coverage issues.

“It is a trap that conservatives are utilizing to distract from the real issues at hand,” stated Evan Low, a former California Meeting member and the brand new president of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund.

Atkins, a former state Senate president professional tempore, former Meeting speaker and the one homosexual main candidate within the governor’s race, stated in an interview that she’s “mindful that as a woman and as a member of the gay community, what I do matters.” She stated she supported the invoice handed by the California Legislature a decade in the past that permits college students to play on sports activities groups that match their gender id.

“This administration is using that as a weapon and politicizing it,” Atkins stated. “That’s just cruel.”

An Related Press ballot present in early Could that Trump’s dealing with of transgender points is extra in style with Individuals than his job efficiency general. And polling completed in January by the New York Occasions discovered that almost 80% of Individuals, together with greater than two-thirds of Democrats, opposed the thought of trans girls competing in girls’s sports activities.

“The Democrats, who are trying to find their voice on so many things right now, don’t know how to handle it,” stated Hank Plante, a political journalist and former fellow on the USC Heart for the Political Future who lives in Palm Springs together with his husband. “They want to be true to their base and to their principles of equal rights. But at the same time, it’s a loser politically when you start talking about nonconforming gender issues and young people.”

One of many Trump marketing campaign’s most bruising assault advertisements final fall confirmed a clip of former Vice President Kamala Harris saying she would help gender-transition surgical procedure for inmates in California’s prisons, then concluded with: “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.”

Assemblymember Christopher M. Ward (D-San Diego), the chair of the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus, stated the governor’s remarks left him “profoundly sickened and frustrated.”

Ron deHarte, the primary homosexual Mexican American mayor of Palm Springs, warned in his speech on the Harvey Milk Variety Breakfast that the LGBTQ+ neighborhood and its allies will “march with greater fervor — we will do more than ever before.”

“If you are a member of the military — transgender or not — if you are willing to fight for me, then I must be willing to fight for you,” deHarte informed the group.

In an interview, deHarte stated that elected officers at the moment are dealing with an moral check over whether or not to talk out in opposition to Trump administration insurance policies that they see as hurting their communities, on the threat of dropping federal funding.

He stated all eyes are on Maine, the place the Trump administration stopped all federal training funding after Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, refused to adjust to Trump’s directive to ban trans ladies from ladies’ sports activities.

“It’s a challenging line to walk,” deHarte stated. “You have to make sure you have not only the right moral standing, but the right legal standing too.”

Since Trump’s inauguration, federal officers have focused California over legal guidelines aimed toward defending trans college students.

The U.S. Division of Training is investigating the California Interscholastic Federation, which oversees sports activities at greater than 1,500 excessive colleges, and the California Division of Training over a regulation that bars colleges from routinely notifying households about points associated to college students’ gender identities.

Homosexual and trans highschool college students proper now are experiencing worry that’s “like being a little more closeted,” stated Delana Martin-Marshall, 38, an artwork instructor at A.B. Miller Excessive Faculty in Fontana.

She and her spouse, a bodily training instructor on the faculty, drove a dozen college students from the college’s gay-straight alliance in two vans to the Harvey Milk Variety Breakfast.

“Students are really scared,” she stated. “Scared of being themselves.”

There’s little that state-level officers can do to reverse choices from the White Home on points like army eligibility and passports, however the state can nonetheless be a refuge for homosexual and trans college students, attendees stated, together with shoring up funding and authorized protections for gender nonconforming college students and for homosexual {couples}.

“The state has to prepare for what’s coming,” Plante stated. He pointed to Justice Clarence Thomas’ concurring opinion when the Supreme Court docket overturned Roe vs. Wade, which stated that the courtroom “should reconsider” previous rulings codifying Individuals’ rights to contraception, same-sex relationships and same-sex marriage.

Christopher Martinez, 32, attended the Harvey Milk Variety Breakfast with fellow college students from School of the Desert who stated they hope the following governor will give attention to the day-to-day points that have an effect on transgender and homosexual faculty college students, together with the rising price of residing and housing insecurity.

“Everything is getting really expensive,” Martinez stated.